Paiute (; also Piute) refers to three non-contiguous groups of

Indigenous peoples of the Great Basin The Indigenous peoples of the Great Basin are Native Americans of the northern Great Basin, Snake River Plain, and upper Colorado River basin. The "Great Basin" is a cultural classification of indigenous peoples of the Americas and a cultural ...

. Although their languages are related within the Numic group of

Uto-Aztecan languages The Uto-Aztecan languages are a family of native American languages, consisting of over thirty languages. Uto-Aztecan languages are found almost entirely in the Western United States and Mexico. The name of the language family reflects the common ...

, these three languages do not form a single subgroup and they are no more closely related to each than they are to the Central Numic languages (

Timbisha The Timbisha ("rock paint", Timbisha language: Nümü Tümpisattsi) are a Native Americans in the United States, Native American tribe federally recognized tribes, federally recognized as the Death Valley Timbisha Shoshone Band of California. The ...

, Shoshoni, and

Comanche The Comanche (), or Nʉmʉnʉʉ (, 'the people'), are a Tribe (Native American), Native American tribe from the Great Plains, Southern Plains of the present-day United States. Comanche people today belong to the List of federally recognized tri ...

) which are spoken between them. The term "Paiute" does not refer to a single, unique, unified group of Great Basin tribes, but is a historical label comprising: *

Northern Paiute people Northern may refer to the following: Geography * North, a point in direction * Northern Europe, the northern part or region of Europe * Northern Highland, a region of Wisconsin, United States * Northern Province, Sri Lanka * Northern Range, ...

of northeastern California, northwestern Nevada, eastern Oregon, and southern Idaho * Southern Paiute people of northern Arizona, southern Nevada, and southwestern Utah * Mono people of east central California, divided into Owens Valley Paiute (Eastern Mono) and Western Mono (Monache)

Linguistic differences

Though sharing similar Numic roots, the three groups historically called Paiute have different languages as shown below: Numic tree

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